Windows Live Messenger connection issue

[polobunny]

Very weird problem. This morning one of my friend comes at work and tells me that;
1) He cannot connect to Windows Live Messenger using his primary MSN account
2) He can however connect to Windows Live Messenger using his other MSN account
3) He can connect to Windows Live Messenger using his primary account if he's on another computer

After speculating and trying a few things over phone once he was at his computer, we found out it was an issue with his user account, as it works fine under the administrator account. I thought "hey, he must have bugged something" and didn't think more about it.
Well after I came back from work, I saw that my MSN on Windows Live Messenger was disconnected. I tried to reconnect, it did exactly what my friend told me it did on his computer. I created a fake account and tested, works. :S
I am very puzzled as what it might be, so i'm just asking if anyone heard about this problem lately? It's weird, 2 in the same day, and I don't remember doing anything suspect.

Thanks

[polobunny]

Sorry for double post, but it was driving me mad. I found my answer, deleted my settings in the registry and tried to connect. Worked.
I know what happened however, it has something to do with the last october Windows Updates.
I however backed my settings and simply merged back the reg file except a few entries that I saw had no link with MSN personnal prefs and it's working top notch now.

[stinger608]

Good job polo!!! I will keep that in mind if someone has that same problem!!!

[fps justin]

sweet. I was having that problem two days ago too. It was horrible. I finally just gave up. LoL

[gvblake22]

Nice detective work there polo! Post up what you cleared in the Registry and where it was located.

[polobunny]

The settings are stored under the HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\MSNMessenger key.
All you need to do is export that whole key to somewhere then delete it from the registry.
Restart Windows Live Messenger and it should remake the key. Close Windows Live Messenger again.
Open registry editor and navigate to that key, then export those values:
-AppSettings
-CachedPolicy0
-MachineGuid

Those values identify your Windows Live computer configuration on Microsoft servers. Delete the HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\MSNMessenger key once again, merge your old settings then merge those 3 values you exported.
The problem is technically *not* your computer when this happens but a conflict between Microsoft servers and your computer when doing the authentification process, as when you log on another account/computer this does not happen. Trying the troubleshooting thing under preferences will not help either. As far as I know about it, apparently it only happens when Windows Live Messenger is open when you do the october Windows Updates, though it does not always happen. =/

Edit: Oh also, a very interesting program to check where certain settings are kept in the registry is RegMon, from SysInternals (www.sysinternals.com). That's what I used, because I had no idea where exactly the settings were kept. :)

[gvblake22]

Awesome, great info polobunny! :thumb:

[stinger608]

Holy crap, just tryed to jump on messanger, and low and behold that same problem!!!! I would be pulling my hair out over this one, but thanks to Polo we have the answer

Thanks Polo